Those intent on tormenting now ex-death-row inmate Mumia
Abu-Jamal have done it again, this time perhaps even exceeding their past
efforts to painfully harass this man widely perceived as a political prisoner.

The latest punitive slap involves Pennsylvania prison
authorities throwing Abu-Jamal into "Administrative Custody" more commonly
known as "The Hole.'

The draconian constraints of AC placement surpass the harsh
restrictions of the death row isolation Abu-Jamal's endured for over a quarter
century.

A jury sentenced Abu-Jamal to death following a controversial
July 1982 conviction for killing a Philadelphia policeman.

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No surprise that this latest punitive assault against
Abu-Jamal has his worldwide support movement in an uproar. Supporters see AC placement
as retaliation from those incensed at Abu-Jamal no longer facing execution.

Energizing supporters is the opposite of what Philadelphia's
District Attorney Seth Williams desired when announcing last month that his
office would not seek reinstitution of Abu-Jamal's death sentence. At the time,
DA Williams said he hoped avoiding a rehearing on the death sentence would
reduce Abu-Jamal to obscurity.

Pennsylvania's governor and the president of Philadelphia's
police union also used the word obscurity when voicing their hopes that the
life sentence for Abu-Jamal would decimate his cause ce'lèbre status among death
penalty abolitions worldwide.

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Prison authorities removed Abu-Jamal from death row hours
after the Philadelphia DA's December announcement, transferring him to an
Administrative Custody cell block inside the death row housing Greene maximum
security prison located more than 300-miles from Philadelphia in southwest
Pennsylvania.

Prison officials rejected the standard procedure of placing
Abu-Jamal in general population, the status for all inmates not sentenced to
death.

Significantly, inmates in general population have full
privileges to visitation (contact, not conjugal contact), telephone and
commissary, along with access to all prison programs and services.

Administrative Custody restrictions, on the other hand, are
punitive in nature, including a limited number of visits, no telephone calls
(except legal or emergency) and limitations on access to legal materials needed
for appeals.

Sue Bensinger, a spokesperson for the Pennsylvania Department
of Corrections, declined comment on Abu-Jamal's case citing the Department's
"security and privacy" regulations.

Bensinger did confirm that authorities now hold Abu-Jamal in
Mahanoy, a medium security prison about 100 miles from Philadelphia in central
Pennsylvania. Mahanoy cannot hold death row prisoners according to DoC
regulation.

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DoC personnel moved Abu-Jamal to Mahanoy from Greene during an
unannounced pre-dawn transfer on December 14, 2011.

Abu-Jamal's December removal from death row was in belated
compliance with federal court rulings voiding Abu-Jamal's death sentence. That
sentence launched Abu-Jamal's decade's long grind on Pennsylvania's death row --
an ordeal federal court rulings (trial and appellate) stated was illegal.

When a federal District Court judge voided Abu-Jamal's death
sentence in December 2001, converting it to a life sentence, Pennsylvania
prison authorities refused to remove him from death row. Authorities justified
their refusal to transfer Abu-Jamal into general population from death row in
2001 as extending a "courtesy" to Philadelphia's District Attorney's Office, to
that city's police union (the Fraternal Order of Police) and to the widow of
the slain officer.

Linn Washington is a weekly columnist for the Philadelphia Tribune and This Can't Be Happening. Washington writes frequently on inequities in the criminal justice system, ills in society and failings of the news media. He teaches multi-media urban (more...)